The Running Grave, page 82
‘Think about it, Prudence, please,’ Robin said. ‘Flora’s got the power to set thousands of people free. I wouldn’t ask, if I didn’t know lives are depending on it.’
107
Nine at the beginning means:
Waiting in the meadow.
It furthers one to abide in what endures.
No blame.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
While Robin was in Kensington, Strike was back in the Denmark Street office, eating his second Chinese meal in two weeks, this time a takeaway. He was finding the last stone to go before hitting his target weight very hard to shift, and while he supposed a nutritionist might tell him the reappearance of takeaways and pub food in his diet might have something to do with that, the lure of sweet and sour chicken and fried rice had proved too strong for him this evening.
He was eating in the office rather than at his flat, because he wanted to look through the CVs of two detectives he thought might be worth interviewing. He also wanted to review the UHC case file within view of the board now covered in pictures and notes relating to the church. He was staring at the board while eating, willing his subconscious to make one of those unexpected leaps that explained everything, when his mobile rang.
‘Hi,’ said Midge. ‘Tasha’s just called. She’s checked in, and she’s already been given a cold green tea enema.’
Strike hastily swallowed a mouthful of sweet and sour chicken.
‘Jesus, there was no need for her to—’
‘She had to, Dr Zhou ordered it. She says it wasn’t bad. Apparently—’
‘No details. I’m eating. What’s the place like, other than the tube up her arse?’
‘Like the lair of a Bond villain, apparently,’ said Midge. ‘All black and smoked glass – but get this. She thinks she might know where they’re keeping your girl.’
‘Already?’ said Strike, pushing away his plate and reaching for a pen.
‘Yeah. There’s an annexe with a “staff only” notice on it. A woman who’s been there before was surprised, because she told Tasha she had a room in the annexe six months ago, so it used to be for guests. Tasha’s already seen a member of the staff taking a tray of food in. Bit of a weird thing to do, unless a masseuse is ill, I suppose.’
‘This sounds promising,’ said Strike.
‘Tasha says she doesn’t want to nose around too much, seeing as she’s only just arrived. She’s gonna do a full day’s treatments tomorrow and then, in the evening, take a walk round the annexe and see whether she can get a peek through any of the windows.’
‘OK, but remind her to be very discreet. If there’s the slightest chance of discovery, she’s to back right off. We don’t want—’
‘You said all this in that forty-odd page email you sent her,’ said Midge. ‘She knows.’
‘She’d better, because it’s not just her who’ll pay if she slips up.’
When Midge had hung up, Strike returned to his takeaway, his slight irritability increased, because it was highly unsatisfactory to be relying on a non-employee in these circumstances. Having finished his food, he got up and peered down through the Venetian blind at the street below.
A tall, fit-looking black man was standing in a doorway on the opposite side of the road. He had short dreadlocks, wore jeans and a padded jacket, but his most distinctive feature, as Strike had noticed when they’d passed each other in Denmark Street earlier, were his pale green eyes.
Having taken a couple of photographs of the man on his phone, Strike let the blinds fall back into place, cleared away the takeaway things, washed his plate and cutlery, then sat down back down to look at the CVs of the two ex-Patterson potential hires. Across that of Dan Jarvis, Shah had scrawled ‘Worked with him, he’s an arsehole.’ Having faith in Shah’s character judgement, Strike tore the CV in half, put it in the bin, and picked up that of Kim Cochran.
His phone rang for a second time. Seeing it was Robin, he answered immediately.
‘Thought you had evening plans?’
‘I did, that’s what I’m calling about. I’ve just had dinner with Prudence. Your sister, Prudence,’ Robin added, when Strike didn’t say anything.
‘What did she want?’ asked Strike suspiciously. ‘Trying to send messages through you, was she? Warning me not to go near Brewster?’
‘No, the exact opposite. Dinner was my idea – not to try and get you two to make up or anything, I’m not meddling in your private life – I wanted to talk to her about Flora. Prudence says she knows Flora’s hiding something she witnessed at Chapman Farm, something connected to the Drowned Prophet. Apparently she keeps sidling up to it in therapy, then backing off again. So, anyway—’
Robin found it hard to judge whether Strike’s silence was ominous, because she was walking along Kensington High Street with a finger in her free ear, to block out the noise of traffic.
‘—I made a hard pitch for Prudence not standing in the way of Flora going to the police, or agreeing to testify against the church in court. I told her I thought immunity could be arranged. I said it might be good for Flora to let it all out.
‘I also asked whether Prudence would be prepared to help somebody who’s just got out of the church, seeing as she’s got experience of what the UHC does to people. It’s probably safer if Will doesn’t visit her house, in case the church is trying to find him, but they could FaceTime or something. If he knows Prudence is your sister, and completely unconnected to his own family, he might agree to speak to her. And if we managed to get Flora and Will talking to each other, they might, I don’t know, find it therapeutic. It might even make them braver, don’t you think?’
Silence was Strike’s only response.
‘Can you hear me?’ said Robin, raising her voice over the rumble of a passing double-decker.
‘What happened,’ said Strike, ‘to me being a chippy, brutal bastard who needs to back right off Brewster, and let her keep drawing pictures for Pinterest?’
‘What happened,’ said Robin, ‘is that I heard Will saying he’s convinced the Drowned Prophet’s going to come and get him. And I can’t get Jacob out of my head. We’ve got to find witnesses who’ll testify against the church. I suppose I’ve come round to your way of thinking. This is the job.’
She was almost at the station. When Strike didn’t speak, she drew aside and leaned up against the wall, phone still pressed to her ear.
‘You’re pissed off I went to Prudence behind your back, aren’t you? I just thought it was easier if she ended up hating me instead of you. I did tell her I was there on my own account. She knows you didn’t ask me to do it.’
‘I’m not pissed off,’ said Strike. ‘If you get results, bloody hell, that’ll be the first ray of light we’ve had in a long time. With Brewster as a witness to what happened to Deirdre Doherty, we might have enough to get police in there, even if Will’s still determined to let the Drowned Prophet get him. Where are you?’
‘Kensington,’ said Robin, who was immensely relieved Strike wasn’t angry.
‘Any red Corsas about?’
‘None,’ she said. ‘I did think a big guy was following me earl—’
‘What?’
‘Calm down, he wasn’t, it was just my imagination. I moved aside and he walked right past me, muttering.’
Now scowling, Strike got to his feet and peered down into Denmark Street again. The green-eyed man was still there, now talking on his phone.
‘Might’ve realised you were wise to him. There’s been a bloke with dreadlocks hanging around outside for about – oh, hang on, he’s off,’ said Strike, watching as the man ended his call and walked away towards Charing Cross Road.
‘You think he was watching the office?’
‘I did, yeah, but he was doing it bloody badly if the aim was to keep undercover. Mind you,’ said Strike, once again letting the Venetian blinds fall, ‘the aim might be to let us know we’re being watched. Little bit of intimidation. What did this large bloke following you look like?’
‘Balding, fifties – I honestly don’t think he was following me, not really. I’m just jumpy. But listen: something weird happened just now, while I was having coffee with Prudence. I got a call from Rufus Fernsby, Walter’s son. The one who slammed the phone down on me, two days ago.’
‘What did he want?’
‘For me to go and visit him at his office tomorrow.’
‘Why?’
‘No idea. He sounded quite tense, and just said, if I wanted to talk to him about his father, I could meet him at the office at a quarter to one and he’d speak to me… why aren’t you saying anything?’
‘It’s just odd,’ said Strike. ‘What’s happened to make him change his mind?’
‘No idea.’
There was another pause, in which Robin had time to reflect upon how tired she felt, and the fact that she still had an hour-long journey home. Since leaving Chapman Farm, she’d both craved and dreaded sleep, because it came punctuated with nightmares.
‘I thought you’d be angry about Prudence and pleased about Rufus,’ she told Strike.
‘I might yet be pleased about both of them,’ said Strike. ‘I just find the volte face strange. OK, I’ll rejig the rota so you can go and interview him at lunchtime. You heading home now?’
‘Yes,’ said Robin.
‘Well, keep your eyes peeled for muttering men, or for a tall black guy with green eyes.’
Robin promised to do so, and rang off.
Strike pulled out his vape pen, inhaled deeply, then picked up Kim Cochran’s CV again. Like Midge, Cochran was ex-police, and had only worked for Patterson for six months before the bugging scandal had sunk the business. Strike was just thinking that she might be worth an interview, when the landline rang in the outer office.
Charlotte, he thought at once – and then, with a strange chill, he remembered that Charlotte was dead.
Getting to his feet, he walked through to Pat’s desk, and answered.
‘Cormoran Strike.’
‘Oh,’ said a female voice. ‘I was going to leave a message, I didn’t expect anyone to—’
‘Who’s this?’
‘Amelia Crichton,’ said Charlotte’s sister.
‘Ah,’ said Strike, bitterly regretting that he hadn’t let the call go to voicemail. ‘Amelia.’
He was momentarily stymied for appropriate words. They hadn’t seen each other in years, and hadn’t liked each other, then.
‘Very sorry about… I’m sorry,’ said Strike.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I was just calling to say, I’m back in town next week and I’d like to see you, if that’s possible.’
Possible, he thought, just not desirable.
‘To tell you the truth, I’m very busy at the moment. Would it be all right if I call you when I know I’ve got a couple of free hours?’
‘Yes,’ she said coldly, ‘all right.’
She gave him her mobile number and rang off, leaving Strike irked and unsettled. If he knew Charlotte, she’d left some kind of dirty bomb behind her, which her sister felt honour bound to pass on: a message, or a note, or some legacy in her will designed to haunt and oppress him, to be one last, and lasting, ‘fuck you’.
Strike returned to the inner office only to pick up the UHC file and Kim Cochran’s CV, then left through the glass door, which he locked. He felt as though Amelia’s call had temporarily polluted his workspace, leaving a wraith of Charlotte peering at him vengefully from the shadows, defying him to return callously to work when he’d just (as she’d undoubtedly see it) turned his back on her, one more time.
108
… one must move warily, like an old fox walking over ice… deliberation and caution are the prerequisites of success.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
When she arrived at 1 Great George Street the following day at half past twelve, Robin discovered that she’d been quite wrong in vaguely imagining the Institute of Civil Engineers would be based in a brutalist building where function had been prioritised over elegance. Rufus Fernsby’s place of work was a gigantic Edwardian building of considerable grandeur.
When she gave the name of the man she’d come to see, Robin was sent up a crimson-carpeted staircase which, coupled with the white walls, reminded her faintly of the farmhouse at Chapman Farm. She passed oil paintings of eminent engineers, and a stained-glass window with a coat of arms supported by a crane and a beaver bearing the motto Scientia et Ingenio, and finally reached a long open-plan room with rows of desks, where two men stood having what looked like a heated discussion while the other workers kept their heads down.
With one of those strange intuitions that admit of no explanation, Robin guessed immediately that the taller, angrier and odder looking of the two men was Rufus Fernsby. Perhaps he looked like the kind of man who’d slam down a phone on someone who mentioned his unsatisfactory father. His argument with the shorter man seemed to centre on whether somebody called Bannerman should, or shouldn’t, have forwarded an email.
‘Nobody’s claiming Grierson shouldn’t have been copied in,’ he was saying heatedly, ‘that’s not the point. What I’m raising here is a pattern of persistent—’
The shorter man, becoming aware of Robin, and possibly looking for a route of escape, said,
‘Can I help you?’
‘—failure to follow an established procedure, which increases the risk of miscommunications, because I might not have realised—’
‘I’m here to meet Rufus Fernsby.’
As she’d feared, the taller man broke off mid-sentence to say angrily,
‘I’m Fernsby.’
‘I’m Robin Ellacott. We spoke—’
‘What are you doing here? You should have waited in the atrium.’
‘The man on the desk sent me up.’
‘Right, well, that’s unhelpful,’ said Rufus.
Dark, lean and wearing a Lycra T-shirt with his work trousers, he had the weather-beaten, sinewy look common to dedicated runners and cyclists, and was sporting what Robin thought was the oddest of all facial hair variations: a chin curtain beard with no moustache.
‘Good luck,’ murmured the second man to Robin as he walked away.
‘I was going to meet you in the café,’ said Rufus irritably, as though Robin should have known this, and perhaps already ordered his food. He checked his watch. Robin suspected he’d have liked to find she’d arrived too early, but as she was exactly on time he said,
‘Come on then – no, wait!’ he added explosively, and Robin came to a halt, wondering what she’d done wrong now, but Rufus had merely realised he was still clutching papers in his hand. Having stalked off to put them back on his desk, he rejoined her, walking out of the room so fast she had to almost jog to keep up.
‘This is a very beautiful building,’ she said, hoping to ingratiate herself. Rufus appeared to consider the comment beneath his notice.
The café on the ground floor was infinitely more upmarket than any that had graced the offices where Robin had once worked as a temporary secretary; there were booths of black leather banquettes, sleek light fittings and expressionist prints on the walls. As they headed for the queue at the counter, and in what she feared would be another doomed attempt to conciliate herself, Robin said,
‘I’m starting to think I should have done engineering, if these are the perks.’
‘What d’you mean?’ said Rufus suspiciously.
‘It’s a nice café,’ said Robin.
‘Oh.’
Rufus looked around as though he’d never before considered whether it was pleasant or not.
‘Yes. I suppose so,’ he said grudgingly. She had the impression he’d rather have found fault with the place.
From the moment Rufus had agreed to meet her, Robin had known that her main objective, that of finding out whether Rosalind Fernsby was the naked girl in the pig mask, would have to be approached tactfully. She didn’t like to imagine how any of her own brothers would react, if shown such a photograph featuring Robin. Having now met Rufus, she was afraid there might be a truly volcanic explosion when she showed him the pictures on her phone. She therefore decided that her secondary objective – that of finding out whether Walter was the person Jiang had recognised as someone who’d come back after many years – would form her first line of questioning.
Having purchased sandwiches, they sat down at a corner table.
‘Well, thanks very much for meeting me, Rufus,’ Robin began.
‘I only called you back because I want to know what exactly’s going on,’ said Rufus severely. ‘I had a call from a policewoman – well, she said she was a policewoman – a week ago. She was asking for contact details for my sister.’
‘Did you give them to her?’
‘I haven’t got any. We don’t talk, haven’t for years. Nothing in common.’
He said it with a kind of pugnacious pride.
‘Then she told me two individuals called Robin Ellacott and Cormorant Strike might make contact with me, because they were trying to dig up dirt on my family. Naturally, I asked for further details, but she said she couldn’t give them, as it was an open investigation. She gave me a number to call if you contacted me. So, when you called – well, you know what happened,’ said Rufus unapologetically. ‘I phoned the number I’d been given and asked for PC Curtis. The man who answered laughed. He passed me to this woman. I was suspicious. I asked for her badge number and jurisdiction. There was a silence. Then she hung up.’
‘Pretty sharp of you to check,’ commented Robin.
‘Well, of course I checked,’ said Rufus, with a whiff of gratified vanity. ‘There’s more at stake for engineers than getting a bad review in some joke social sciences journal, if we don’t check.’
‘D’you mind if I take notes?’ she asked, reaching into her bag.
‘Why should I mind?’ he said irritably.
